May 23, 2024 • 52 mins
Teresa Amabile - The Progress Principle
The Progress Principle: How Small Wins Boost Motivation and Happiness at Work
In the latest episode, Aidan McCullen welcomes Teresa Amabile, author of 'The Progress Principle,' to delve into her extensive research on motivation and emotions in the workplace.
Amabile's study of nearly 12,000 diary entries from workers in seven companies reveals that making even small progress in meaningful work is crucial for positive emotions and high motivation.
The conversation touches on key concepts like the role of clear goals, autonomy, sufficient resources, and the importance of supportive interpersonal events in fostering a productive work environment. The script also previews Amabile's upcoming book, 'Retiring: Creating a Life That Works for You,' which explores the challenges and experiences of transitioning into retirement.
00:00 Unlocking Motivation: The Power of Progress
01:34 Welcome Teresa Amabile: Exploring The Progress Principle
02:52 From Work Progress to Retirement: A New Research Journey
09:43 The Progress Principle: Small Wins, Big Impact
10:56 Managers, Take Note: The Surprising Truth About Motivation
17:27 Catalysts and Nourishers: The Keys to Sustained Progress
29:25 Real-World Impact: Stories from the Research
41:30 The Inner Work-Life Effect: A Deep Dive into Research Findings
50:50 A Call to Action for Leaders and Individuals
51:24 Closing Thoughts and Future Works
Find Teresa here: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=6409
The Progress Principle here: https://www.progressprinciple.com
Tags: Aidan McCullen, Teresa Amabile, The Progress Principle, Inner Work Life, Creativity at Work, Employee Motivation, Small Wins, Positive Emotions, Innovation Management, Employee Engagement, Job Satisfaction, Workplace Psychology, Career Development, Retirement Planning, Work-Life Balance, Leadership Skills, Management Strategies, Team Building, Productivity, , Organizational Behavior
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Aidan McCullen (00:00):
A close analysis of nearly twelve thousand diary entries
(00:03):
together with the writers daily ratingsof their motivations and emotions
shows that making progress in one'swork even incremental progress,
is more frequently associated withpositive emotions and high motivation.
Then any other workday event thekey to motivation doesn't depend
on elaborate incentive systems infact the people in this study rarely
(00:26):
mentioned incentives in their diaries.
On days when workers have the sensethey're making headway in their jobs
or when they receive support thathelps them overcome obstacles their
emotions are more positive and theirdrive to succeed is at its peak.
Drawing on over thirty years of researchtoday's book focuses on a study that
(00:49):
looked deeply inside seven companiestracking day to day events that move
the inner work lives of their people.
In addition to revealing how much intheir work life matters to employees and
thus to companies our guests researchturned up another deeper layer of meaning
concerning events that are part of everyworkers day three types of events in
(01:12):
particular what she calls the key threestand out as particularly potent forces
supporting inner work life in this orderprogress in meaningful work, catalysts
events that directly help project work,and nourishers interpersonal events
that uplift the people doing that work,.
(01:34):
It is a huge pleasure to welcomethe author of that book and that
research the author of the progressprinciple using simple wins to ignite
joy engagement and creativity at workteresa amabile welcome to the show,
Teresa Amabile (01:49):
Thank you so much.
Aiden.
I'm delighted to be herewith you and your audience
Aidan McCullen (01:53):
it's so great to have you been dying to cover this book for
such a long time and the good news foraudience i have a copy of this book up
for grabs for those people are signedup to our sub stack but firstly, teresa
i want to come to you and say thankyou for covering this book because I
know that your work has moved on andyou have made progress in your own
(02:14):
research and moved on to something else.
I thought we'd share that up front startof today's show because it's something
that I'd love to cover in the future.
Teresa Amabile (02:22):
Aidan.
I appreciate that.
I smile when I realize that youand I pronounce the main word
in my title differently, andthat's absolutely fine with me.
As you just , so concisely put it, thework That led to the book, The Progress
Principle, showed that of all theevents that happen at work that can
(02:43):
make for a truly wonderful workday,the single most important is simply
making progress in meaningful work.
After I finished that research, wrotethe book, gave many, many talks about the
book, I started wondering, What happenswhen people have meaningful work, and
(03:08):
then they need to leave that work behind?
What happens when people who havebeen really engaged in something
they're doing, have been doing acareer, a job, maybe for decades?
What happens?
What is that experience like as they'releaving it behind for retirement?
(03:29):
So that was what sparked my interest instudying retirement, which I've been doing
for the past decade now, with four amazingcolleagues here in the Boston area.
And we are right now finishing upthe book, reporting on that research.
The book is called, "Retiring,Creating a Life that Works for You."
(03:53):
So I am going to be hoping that I cancome on your show in the future and
talk about that research, that work, andwe do have some findings on creativity
and progress in that book as well.
It was coming out of 215 interviewswith 120 people over many years.
(04:15):
Some of whom we followed throughtheir retirement transition.
So I hope to be able to share thatwith your audience in the future
Aidan McCullen (04:22):
We would absolutely welcome that and maybe you'll give
us a few insights into that becauseI often think about this and I've
seen it with people when they retire.
If they're too interwoven their identityis too interwoven with their career they
really struggle with work life afterwork and they go back to the office
(04:43):
they think maybe they might fulfill lifewith golf or whatever they have decided
but soon enough that drives up and.
It makes total sense thatit's because probably they're
no longer making progress.
Teresa Amabile (04:56):
I think that's a big part of it.
In fact, that is one of themain findings of our research.
That is that identity issues can loomlarge as a person retires, especially for
those who closely identified with eitherthe work itself or their organization,
maybe their team, their profession.
(05:20):
If they felt that they were theirwork, , they didn't have much of
an identity outside of that work.
I am a lawyer.
I am a surgeon.
I'm an engineer.
I am a marketing specialist.
That transition can feel like.
(05:40):
losing yourself.
But we found also that for some people,the identity issues are not that strong.
They're not that extreme.
And yet the retirement transitioncan present difficulties
because of relationship issues.
(06:02):
Some people, of course, have identityissues and relationship issues, but
one of the most surprising findingswas how many couples happily together
for many years find that they, theyreally have to adjust to each other
(06:23):
after one or both of them retires.
They have to come upwith new relationships.
routines and rhythms for their life, theyneed to rediscover each other sometimes.
Because it's often the case thatthey have never had this much time
together, since they were first datingperhaps, they were first married.
(06:46):
Or maybe not ever, because when they firstgot together, they may well have already
been deeply engaged in work or study.
Something that occupied many, many hoursof their, their waking lives every week.
And now they're sitting there looking ateach other across the breakfast table and
(07:10):
sometimes wondering, who are you really?
What do we have to talk about?
What is it we'd like to do with ourday, our week, the rest of our lives?
So that, that's an interestingchallenge and , we've seen some
fascinating differences in the waysthat people approach that challenge.
(07:34):
And the third challenge, this maybe the biggest one, and it faces
everyone, is how to restructureyour life after you've retired.
And of course that has to do with theclose relationships you have and the, and
the more casual relationships you have,but it also has to do with the question of
(07:55):
what are you going to do with your time?
With the 35 or 40, sometimes 60 hours aweek that you've been spending engaged
in your work, whether you loved it oryou didn't love it at all, your work
structured your life for many, many years.
(08:15):
And now it's up to you tostructure your life to decide
how you want to spend your time.
Do you want to be really activeright from the beginning?
Do you want to be, on the go, go,go, travel, or volunteer work, or
perhaps finding a part time job?
Do you want to get very engaged in takingcare of your grandchildren, perhaps?
(08:41):
Or would you prefer a more relaxedpace and just seeing what emerges?
In your life, maybe, spending moretime reading the books that you've
been stacking up and waiting toget to gardening enjoying walks,
becoming more physically fit.
(09:01):
There are great variations in whatpeople end up finding for themselves
and building this new life and how longit takes them to find a life structure
that really feels satisfying for them.
Aidan McCullen (09:17):
You've whet our appetite for this show as well because preparing
for that obviously has to happen beforethe event itself so you have to do the
work before you discover just like aninnovation you do the work before the
crisis so the crisis isn't so bad whichis a beautiful way for the progress
principle the progress principle i shouldsay i keep interchanging it so i've been
(09:41):
trying to pronounce it the way you do,
there's a lot of things we aresure what my irish accent would say
differently including Amabile whichi had to practice before we came on
to the show live, so let's get intothe progress principle because i have
to say it made me think about so manythings reading this book and if you're
(10:02):
a manager or ceo or your lead peoplein anyway or even just leading yourself
understanding this principle is so
valuable for your progress of work butalso for your mental health i felt that
big time and also in the fact that wheni think about the times i was frustrated
in my working life, it's because i was nolonger making any progress i was maybe in
(10:29):
when i was a professional athlete injuredor not getting selected in the team.
Or in the real world when i was workingin organizations many times working
in innovation somebody like a cfokilling the progress killing the idea.
Absolutely had a dramatic effect onyour mental health as an innovator
(10:50):
or change maker so maybe we'll openwith that because that would make
it hyper relevant to our audience
Teresa Amabile (10:56):
You noted that many managers don't give the
sufficient thought, and that wasone of the biggest surprises to us.
After we discovered the progressprinciple, and how, that is, how
important it is for people to beable to make at least some progress
(11:19):
in their work on a regular basis.
We told , some groups ofexecutives about this finding.
And we often got a kind of puzzledlook from them, or maybe a shrug.
Well, sure.
Yeah, people feel goodwhen they Make progress.
(11:42):
Sure.
Yeah, everybody knows that.
But you know what?
We didn't think so.
Because the managers in the companieswhere we did this diary study, many of
the managers seemed oblivious of theimportance of progress, because they
did virtually nothing to pay attentionto whether their people, their teams,
(12:08):
were able to make regular progress.
In their work, so we did a little surveyof nearly 700 managers and executives
from companies around the world.
We asked them a simple question.
We're going to list 5 motivators.
(12:29):
We're going to ask you of thesemotivators rank order them in terms
of how important you think they are.
For people in their work.
We had the usual suspects.
We had tangible reward for the work,pay, promotion, that sort of thing.
(12:50):
Recognition for the work.
We had clear goals in thework, interpersonal support,
and of course we had progress.
Now, we know from our research thatprogress was number 1 by far in terms
of being able to motivate peopleday to day to really get into their
(13:15):
work, engage in it, innovatively,creatively, productively these.
669 managers.
did not rank Progress asthe number one motivator.
In fact, they didn't rank it as thenumber two motivator, or the number
three, or the number four motivator.
(13:38):
They ranked it, on average, over allthese people, it was ranked dead last.
In fact, only 5 percent of thesemanagers ranked Progress number one.
If they had been making theirchoices randomly, 20 percent of
them would have selected progress.
(13:58):
Number 1, it's as if they were saying,we don't think this is that important.
And it's more importantthan anything else.
So that.
To me is the most shocking finding ofthis and why I felt so driven to write
(14:19):
this book and to get the word out.
And I've written a number ofarticles with this message.
I've tried to speak withas many groups as I can.
And I'm so delighted that you'rebringing this message to your audience.
Because it's not top of mindand I can understand that.
Managers have a lot tothink about in their work.
(14:41):
It's not easy.
They have to think about their strategy.
They have to think about what aretheir customers doing, what are
their customers wanting and needing.
They have to thinkabout their competitors.
They have to think about what'sgoing on in the in the local
environment, the local economy.
They have to think about what'sgoing on in the global economy.
(15:04):
What are the social and demographictrends that might be affecting our
business now and in the future?
There's a lot, and it makes it so easyto stop thinking about what's going
on internally with the people whoare actually executing your strategy.
(15:26):
They need the catalyst that you mentioned.
They need the nourishers youmentioned on a regular basis.
They need at least a bit of attentionevery day, every week, so that they can
simply be enabled to do their best work.
That is to make progress in their work.
Aidan McCullen (15:47):
i thought about this teresa as a parent , i
remember my younger guy.
Never played soccer before and he's crazyabout soccer now but his friends were
ahead of him a few years and knowing how,you can actually create positive habits
i brought him out regularly and yourbook helped me even think back over that
(16:10):
and i thought about why he has done sowell was because each day we practiced.
I considered that i was setting thebar low enough that he would succeed so
it was slightly difficult but it wouldbe slightly more difficult but not too
difficult and i think it's that sweetspot that to your point he's making
progress but then i also understoodthe neuroscience of that that there's a
(16:34):
dopamine hit behind this every time whenyou achieve it's almost like having your
to do list everyday and as you take thingsoff being you get it open me in here and
then at the end of the book you talk aboutthe checklist and the importance of this
daily checklist and i'm jumping to therebecause i know, many of our listeners are
extremely busy and may not get throughthe entire show so i thought this was so
(16:59):
so important that i bring it right fromthe back of the book right to the front.
And share this with our audienceparticularly if you're a manager.
, Teresa Amabile (17:05):
you want to use a checklist, like this, to help
yourself think about what yourpeople need to make progress.
Now, that means you need to be inclose enough touch with them either
observing them frequently, ideallycommunicating with them about how
the work is going, what they need,what might be getting in the way.
(17:27):
So I'm going to go through thecatalysts, which are on the checklist.
I'm going to go throughthe nourishers as well.
But let me first of all say, Initially,you want to just ask people, find out if
they feel they're making progress on themost important work that they need to do.
(17:48):
And if not, why not?
If so, what's helping to catalyze theirprogress so that you can make sure that
those supports stay in place for them.
The opposite of progress,of course, is setbacks.
So you do want to have progress andsetbacks right at the top of your
checklist this note are people Makingprogress in their most important work
(18:16):
and you want to look specificallyat the catalysts for progress Are
these things that you're doing?
Are these things that your people have.
The opposite of thecatalyst are the obstacles.
So as I go through the catalyst, you caneasily imagine what the opposites are.
And those are things that you want totry to scrub from your work environment
(18:37):
as much as possible , and dampen themdown as much as you can as a manager.
The first catalyst is simplyclear goals and meaningful work.
Make sure that people understand how whatthey do every day connects to something
(18:57):
that matters, whether it's setting upthe laboratory for the scientists, so that
everything they need the next morning.
is in place, they can do theirwork in trying to discover new
drugs to treat serious diseases.
I actually spoke with a janitor, thehead of maintenance services at a
(19:23):
pharmaceutical, a biopharma companyseveral years ago, and he talked about
how meaningful he felt his work was.
Because he and his team were enablingthe scientists to get in there and do
the work of helping to cure diseases.
He was able to connect what hewas doing to that meaningful goal.
(19:43):
And I think it's because that companydid a great job of occasionally
bringing in patients who hadbeen helped by their medicines.
And inviting everyone in thecompany to come to these sessions.
Or to watch the video of, the patienttalking about how their lives had
been transformed and the goals haveto be clear, not just meaningful,
(20:05):
but clear people need to know whatthey're doing and why it matters.
The next is autonomy.
So, even as people arehaving those clear goals.
They need to feel that they have autonomy.
They have some freedom in decidinghow to meet those goals, that
they can use their own ideas.
They can use their owncreativity to get there.
(20:27):
Next is sufficient resources.
You can't do the work if you don't havethe necessary resources, and I'm not
talking about lavish resources, whichcan actually kind of smother a project.
I'm talking about the resources thatpeople really need to get their work
done, so that they're not spendingall of their time trying to find those
(20:52):
resources rather than doing the work.
The next is simply help with the work.
When things are really difficult,getting people the expertise that they
need, the information that they need,or perhaps sitting down and helping
yourself in any way that you can.
The next catalyst is in some ways,the most difficult for managers to do.
(21:17):
And that is having an atmosphere whereeveryone views problems and mistakes
as learning opportunities, ratherthan opportunities to bury it, pretend
it didn't happen, or opportunitiesto castigate people and blame.
No, let's look at what happened.
(21:39):
Let's see what we can learnfrom it and move on from there.
The next catalyst is open idea flow.
And that is within the group,ideally within the department and
within the whole organization, asense that new ideas are welcome.
And I'm sure you've seen thisin your innovation research
(22:00):
yourself, your innovation practice.
Ideas are welcome.
Not that every idea will be accepted.
Of course not.
But every idea will be respected enoughto get a fair hearing and finally
sufficient time, but not too much.
We found that people do their optimalwork and make the best progress.
(22:24):
when they understand that there is anurgent need for what they're doing,
that adds to the meaningfulness of it.
But when they have enough time to think,when they have enough time to explore for
that creative solution, that's going toreally serve better the purpose that they
have for , that clear and meaningful goal.
(22:44):
So those are the seven catalysts.
I'll go through them quickly again, cleargoals and meaningful work, Autonomy.
sufficient resources, help withthe work, learning from problems
and successes, open idea flow, andsufficient time, but not too much.
(23:06):
So those are the factorsthat catalyze progress.
And you can imagine theopposite of each of those.
Try not to do those things.
Aidan McCullen (23:17):
Well, the catalysts, I mean, they seem so simple and they
seem so straightforward, but as youshow in your research, and I want to
share the depth of the research here,I mentioned the 12, 000 and the seven
companies, these were real companies.
I want to share that with ouraudience, real companies anonymized.
The people were anonymized andthese people talk at time every
(23:40):
day to daily diary, what wasgoing on in their inner work life.
And I want to share whatthat term means as well.
But before we do share that research, I'dlove you to do share, share the opposite,
just for anybody who's unaware of that,because there was stuff like autonomy,
but there's a sweet spot with all thesethings that , autonomy is great, but
(24:01):
sometimes people feel somebody who'sgiving them autonomy with no direction
means that they don't care or they'rescattered, et cetera, or the opposite.
In times of crisis, amanager might think they're.
Giving guidance, but they're micromanagingand there's a, there's a lot in there.
So it's probably veryuseful to show the opposite.
I'd love if you would.
Teresa Amabile (24:22):
Of course.
Yes.
And you actually use the phrase.
That's the key here with autonomy.
You want direction.
People can get, if they have toomuch autonomy, there's no direction.
You need to combine the cleargoals with the autonomy, right?
So people should know whichmountain we're going to climb.
(24:45):
That's the clear goals, but theyshould have autonomy as much as
possible in deciding how to climbit as long as they're getting there.
As long as they are making progresstoward that goal, allow them
as much autonomy as possible.
Micromanaging is definitelythe opposite of autonomy.
That's almost never the way to go.
(25:06):
There does need to be a balanceof the clarity of goals.
But the autonomy in achieving the goals.
Efficient resources, you know, I've seena number of cases where people were so
starved of resources, resources thatI knew existed in the organization,
(25:27):
because I had a bigger picture ofwhat was going on in the organization,
but they didn't have access to thoseresources because they didn't have a
manager who was advocating for them.
They couldn't get access, forexample, to the equipment they needed.
To do that next experiment .To test thisnew product, or to test this manufacturing
(25:49):
process that they were developing . All itwould take was a little bit of attention
on the part of the manager to say, oh,well, we, you know, we can work out
the schedule so that the departmentscan seamlessly share this equipment.
Rather than the department thathappens to have the biggest bully
for their manager, getting theaccess to the equipment all the time.
(26:11):
Right?
So there are a lot of politicalissues in organizations.
That managers can cut through,but the people doing the work
cannot cut through those.
The opposite of that is simply ignoringthe fact that people are struggling.
And not realizing that sometimes simpleaccess to an expert who exists in the
organization , could get them overthe hump , of a complex project where
(26:37):
they're suffering setback after setback,learning from problems and successes.
there are 2 forms of opposites there.
1 is pretending that it didn'thappen and never talking about it.
Which just leads to feelingsof shame and embarrassment.
Or calling people out, calling individualsout for having made a mistake or for
(27:03):
having tried something that failed.
Which also leads to shame, andpulling back, , and risk aversion.
So the ideal is to say, yeah, this didn'twork right, or yes, this was a mistake.
But what can we learn from it?
Let's try to extractsome failure value here.
(27:25):
Because almost always it is possible,at least to extract a lesson of
how not to do things in the future.
But sometimes there's a real gem oflearning within a mistake or a setback
and the projects that we studied, theproject teams that we studied, were all
(27:45):
working on complex problems that requiredcreative solutions and you can't work
on a creative problem without makingsome mistakes without having some dead
ends that you follow, you have to havean atmosphere of psychological safety.
That's a term that , my colleague, AmyEdmondson at Harvard Business School
(28:07):
has written about so eloquently anddone so much important research on.
If you can establish that psychologicalsafety in the organization, where you
yourself, the manager , will, Admitwhen you've made a mistake, when
you've tried something that, okay,folks, we tried this new approach.
It's not working.
Let's regroup.
Let's do something else thatfrees everyone up to feel that
(28:31):
they can take reasonable risks.
They can be creative and it's not goingto be the end of the world if it doesn't
work out and finally sufficient time Isaw so many cases of what we call being
on a treadmill Where people feel thatthey're just running constantly from one
thing to the next with no time to thinkthat's Never optimal for creativity.
(28:58):
Yeah.
Sometimes creative work has to bedone under the gun when there's a
truly urgent need for a solution.
If that's the case, it's importantto clear the decks and, allow people
to simply focus on that problemand not be distracted by meetings
(29:19):
and administrative paperwork.
And that sort of thing,but to really focus.
Can I tell a little storyhere from, from our diaries?
Aidan McCullen (29:28):
Please do.
Teresa Amabile (29:31):
So this was a fascinating story of an information management
team that was about, , six peopleworking on an incredibly important
project for the company with 145million at stake for the company.
(29:52):
And they had only 8 daysto solve this problem.
It was a problem having to do withtheir most important customer.
This information management team.
Was 1, where we saw more catalysts andnourishers during those 8 days than we saw
(30:12):
in some other teams, the entire period ofmonths that we followed them for 1 thing.
Top management made very clearhow important this project was.
So everyone knew that it really mattered.
It was a meaningful goal.
The top management also clearedthe decks for that team, told them,
(30:36):
don't worry about anything elsethat's been on your plate right now.
You can set aside all the other projectsand simply focus on this problem.
Everyone on the team pulled together.
In fact, one person postponed hervacation week, so she could come
in and work with her teammates onthis, intensely important project.
(31:00):
Certain groups in the organization helpedout, helping to do analyses or bringing
in information that might be useful.
No one showed more catalysts andnourishers, though, than that team leader.
She Got in there rolled up her sleevesand worked right alongside everyone else
solving 1 technical problem after anotherand she kept everyone's spirits up by
(31:26):
doing things like singing a silly songas midnight approached on the 7th night.
Well, the outcome was a success.
A true example of creativeproductivity, they did it.
And their feelings duringthat time you might think were
(31:47):
terrible, but they were not.
It was just the opposite.
They were energized by this.
They felt an incrediblesense of camaraderie.
In fact, 1 guy on this team said inhis diary, things have been crazy.
We've been working around the clock,but everyone has been staying on
(32:09):
the cheery side of the street.
God help me.
I do love them so, so, I mean, it wasjust a marvelous, marvelous story.
Aidan McCullen (32:20):
You beat me to it and i absolutely love that story it
was one i definitely wanted to shareif you don't mind i'll just quote
a little piece from here because.
This can show how simple a smallgesture can be so this lady who
had she had a family by the way soshe came back from holidays having
a family left the family etc.
(32:41):
And you expected to seeher diary entry being.
Extremely negative like we allwould but you were surprised by the
opposite but it was because of thisgoldilocks effect of several different
catalysts one of them was so simplea senior manager drop by with some
she called it fancy mineral water.
(33:01):
And in the book you write perhaps for thefirst time in a long while the top manager
was humanized he had done something ininverted commas nice, he had shown that
he noticed her work and he cared but themanagers gesture, Altered perceptions
of the work itself, which are even morecentral to the way that progress operates
(33:22):
on the inner work life, because highlevel managers almost never stopped by
to encourage the team in any way and hisaction signified to the team how important
this project was to the organization that.
Seemingly simple gesture that seeminglymeaningless gesture had such a dramatic
effect on inner work life of people andi'm using that as a segue to share that
(33:47):
before we then share the research andthe depth of research that you did here.
Teresa Amabile (33:52):
Yes, thank you , for quoting that.
Because I'd forgotten that little bitabout stopping by with mineral water.
And I think the next nighthe stopped by with pizza.
They were working late and he camewith some boxes of pizza, right?
Yeah, I see you nodding.
Yes.
And the other thing I wanted to mentionwas there were nourishers there, right?
(34:12):
The four nourishers are, firstof all, respect and recognition.
He was showing That herespected their work.
He understood what experts they werein this particular problem solving
realm, and he recognized them.
He recognized them as individuals andas a team for what they were doing.
(34:33):
The second nourisher is encouragement.
Of course, he was encouragingthem and what they were doing.
The third nourisher is emotional support.
I don't think he specifically showedemotional support, but that team leader
absolutely showed emotional support.
(34:55):
She was there for her people.
If they were struggling withsomething professionally or
personally, they could talk to her.
And the fourth one,affiliation and camaraderie.
Well, you saw it allover that story, right?
Someone giving up her vacation week.
someone else saying we're all workingaround the clock doing just crazy
(35:17):
hard things, but we love each other.
We're in this together.
It was really an almost perfectexample of the seven catalysts
and the four nourishers.
Aidan McCullen (35:30):
It's a great story and let's mention that before i keep
bringing you off track by the wayi've only got like five percent of
my notes and again i have a copyof the book up for grabs i highly
highly recommend the book it can be.
Somewhat hurtful reading in times i wassad reading the diary entries of many
many of the people because i empathizedas well because i've been there.
(35:54):
And i'll just quote a little piecehere because this will actually be
a nice way to introduce the companiesand the research that you did.
This company you anonymized as carpenterthe book opens with this company selling
off whatever assets is left of thecompany auctions of the furniture and
some of the key workers, standing therein the auction lot looking on distraught.
(36:18):
And four years previously.
Carpenter had brought in a new topexecutive team which reorganized all
the divisions into cross functionalbusiness teams with each team managing
a set of related product lines, thiscompany at the time was top of the
game recognized as being innovative.
When interviewers asked for thecompany's success formula, these
executives told a compelling story aboutthe new model they were bringing in.
(36:42):
Each team was to function as anentrepreneurial group, autonomously
responsible for everything frominventing new products to managing
inventory and profitability.
Best of all they would have the resourcesof a substantial corporation to back
them up with minimal interference.
Fast forward then to another excerpti took this was a fateful product
(37:03):
meeting that took place and thiswas from a diary entry by one of the
people in that this product reviewmeeting proved to be a major event
for the people of the domain team.
This will make so much senseto so many of our audiences.
Teresa, |" Like the slash of asword, it cut down months of the
(37:23):
team's product development work.
Not only did it provoke unhappinessand frustration, it soured
people's views of management anddrained motivation of the work.
Well- meaning as we know theywere carpenters managers did not
understand the power of what you callinner work life, the perceptions,
emotions and motivations that peopleexperience as they react to and make
(37:48):
sense of the events in the workday."
That is such a crucial part of thebook and one that our audience which
are many change makers many peopleworking in longer term projects
even in transformation that.
They can be Working on something and thenall of a sudden new management come in
(38:10):
change direction and all the work alltheir progress is just gone overnight
Teresa Amabile (38:15):
Absolutely.
And think about, you correctly notedthat inner work life is the perceptions,
emotions, and motivations that peoplehave as they react to and try to make
sense of the events going on around them.
What sense did they make of this?
The sense they made ofit was, we don't matter.
(38:38):
Our ideas don't matter.
Our efforts are fruitless.
What does that do to perceptions ofthe organization and self perceptions?
What does that do to emotions?
You can hear it in, in,in that description.
And, and what does it do to motivation?
(39:00):
Kills it.
It kills it.
So, yes, of course, sometimesmanagers do need to change direction.
They need to change strategybecause external conditions
have changed dramatically.
But they can do it in a way thatdoesn't kill inner work life.
They can do it in a way that says,Oof, this is a body blow to us.
(39:25):
And we know it's going tofeel even worse to you.
We respect what you've done.
You have done great work.
And maybe someday we can returnto developing this product
line, to developing thesegreat ideas that you have.
What you have done will not be lost.
But please work with us.
(39:46):
To go in this new direction
That is not at all what this companydid this company that we call carpenter.
They just came in by Fiat.
Okay, what you've done,it's all off the table.
This is what you're going to be doing now.
(40:06):
And that company became a drain.
It became a drain where the very bestpeople were just leaving in droves and
they couldn't, stop that brain drain.
And within just, I think it was threeyears after that incident that you
(40:27):
described there, the company wasdoing very poorly, , innovation had
dried up to a trickle, profitabilityhad tanked, and the company was
acquired by a smaller rival.
And then it was being completely sold off.
And that's the auction that you described.
(40:47):
And some people, , this was acompany town, pretty much people
from the community, many of them,former workers here, we're standing
around watching this auction andseeing , , their desks and their
chairs and their, workstations being,auctioned off, just standing there,
some of them with tears in their eyes.
Aidan McCullen (41:07):
Very sad very sad and that's what i mean
the empathy you have with thatbecause these are real companies.
Let's share how you did this how you didthis research because the appendix in
the book is huge because of the amount ofresearch that you and your colleagues did.
Teresa Amabile (41:21):
Yes.
Listeners, you don't have toread the research appendix.
I will give you the, I will give youa very high level version right now.
, we decided that the best way to understandwhat really happens at work inside
people's hearts and minds was to ask themto fill out a very short, Confidential
electronic diary for us every day duringthe entire course of a project because
(41:47):
of my fascination with creativity andinnovation and how important that is
for for the success of any business.
And any social initiative, bythe way, any nonprofit as well,
I wanted to study people workingon complex, creative projects.
So we, we sought teams of peoplewho are doing such projects
(42:10):
because work like that does notget done by individuals any longer.
We're in a world whereteams do this sort of work.
So we went to a number of companies.
asking if we might, they mightallow us to recruit their teams
doing complex creative projects.
This was mostly product development.
(42:30):
Sometimes it was process development.
Sometimes it was solvingcomplex client problems.
About half the companies we approachedsaid, yes, and we ended up with
7 companies participating in thisresearch, a total of 26 project
teams within those 7 companies and239 individuals in those teams.
(42:54):
And a team would sign up , if reallyjust about everyone on the team , was
willing to participate in the teamsvaried in size from 3 people to 9 people.
And that's fairlytypical in organizations.
for your questions.
The projects people wereworking on varied in length.
The shortest was 3 monthsand the longest was 9 months.
(43:16):
We use a number of techniques to keeppeople motivated to fill out these
electronic diaries for us at the endof each workday, Monday through Friday.
We just sent it in the email.
It was a very short survey withsome numerical questions on it about
their emotions, perceptions andmotivations that day, specifically.
(43:38):
And the most important question at theend of the diary, the daily diary was.
Of all the events that happened today,think of one that stands out in your mind.
It can be any event at all, as longas it's relevant to your work or
this project that you're working on.
And we tell them it could even besomething from their personal life, as
(44:00):
long as it was relevant to their work.
And we asked them to describethe event very concretely, what
happened, and who was involved.
That was how , we were able to study.
The impact of these day by dayevents inside organizations on
people's inner work life, and wewere able to study the impact of
(44:23):
inner work life on people's work.
Not only did we have these diaries,but we also got assessments.
Of each individual's creativityand productivity and Colleagueship
and commitment to the workevery month from their closest
(44:44):
colleagues and their supervisors.
So we had these, these externalmeasures of people's performance.
And we made our 1st discovery, puttingthat performance data together with
the inner work life data, whichwe had from every daily diary.
We knew about emotions, perceptions, andmotivations from those daily diaries.
(45:06):
And the first discovery we callthe inner work life effect.
And that is on those days, and thoseweeks, and those months when people are
having their most positive emotions,, their most positive perceptions of
the organization, their team, Eventhemselves, and when they have the
strongest intrinsic motivation, thatis being really jazzed about the
(45:31):
work, really excited about the work.
And those days and weeks and months,that's precisely when people are most
likely to be creative in their work,productive, show the highest level
of commitment to their work, andbe better colleagues to each other,
which of course raises the level ofeveryone else's performance around them.
(45:53):
So that's the inner work life effect.
And then we thought, okay, if inner worklife is so important to performance, what
makes a difference for inner work life?
And that's when we discoveredthe progress principle.
We went in and looked at people'svery best inner work life days, you
(46:15):
know, the best emotions, motivationsand perceptions and the very worst.
And we looked at whether therewere differences in the kinds of
events occurring on those days.
And, oh boy, did we find huge differences.
The single biggest differentiator.
(46:37):
was whether people were makingprogress in their work or
having setbacks in their work.
The best inner work life days, 76percent of those best inner work
life days had a progress event.
67 percent of the worst innerwork life days had a setback,
(46:57):
which is the opposite of progress.
It's feeling like you're being stalledin your work, you can't move forward,
or maybe you're, even going backwards.
It's
We did find other positive events,of course, and other negative events,
but none of them even came closeto being as important , as progress
(47:19):
or in its negative form setbacks.
We even found what we callthe power of small wins.
And that is the progress principleeven operates with really small step
forward, steps forward, things thatto us as observers looked almost
trivial, but they could be so meaningfuland so energizing and motivating to
(47:44):
people on the day that they happen.
An example is again from thatinformation management team.
I was talking about beforewe had an engineer who was
working at a very complex.
Computer program for an important clientand there was a bug in the program that
he wasn't able to identify for a few daysand we saw him in his diary every day
(48:09):
say, ah, this bug is driving me crazy.
I can't figure it out.
And then later in the week,he said, I smashed that bug.
That's been frustrating mefor almost a calendar week.
That may not be an event to you, but Ilive a very drab life, so I'm all hyped.
(48:30):
Most of my team members who wouldknow about this are out today.
So I have to sit here rejoicingin my solitary smugness.
That is one of my very favorite diaryentries, which is why I've memorized it.
His joy was palpable and in the ratingshe gave for his emotions, perceptions,
(48:51):
motivation that day, as you might imagine,we're all at the top of the scale.
That's a really small thing, right?
In the, in the grand scheme of thatguy's Career, even in the grand scheme
of that project, it was no big thing.
It was just a bug.
But the thing is, it was a big thing tohim on the day that it happened, , and
(49:13):
he was happy for days after that.
And we know from our research , , inthis research program, that being happy,
you're more likely to be creative andproductive and more committed to the work
that you're doing and a better colleague.
To other people.
And interestingly, we found that28 percent of small events had a
(49:38):
really big impact on inner worklife the day that they happened.
Unfortunately, negative events havea stronger impact in the negative
direction than positive eventshave in the positive direction 3
to 4 times as strong an impact.
So that means ideally for every.
(49:59):
Step backward and there arealways going to be steps backward.
You need to help people have a coupleof steps forward if you're going to
truly promote positive inner work life.
If you can do that with, the concreteobvious management 101 things you do,
those catalysts and those nourishers.
(50:21):
You are likely to set some positivespirals in motion where people are
having good inner work life becauseof the nourishers you're giving them.
They're therefore more likelyto make progress, especially
if you have catalysts in place.
And that in turn, that progress isgoing to lead to better inner work
(50:43):
life, which will in turn lead to morecreative and productive progress.
Aidan McCullen (50:50):
Beautiful absolutely beautiful i had a quote that was a
call to action for leaders but youabsolutely nailed it there is exactly
the right concept of helping peoplemake progress clear the obstacles
give them encouragement give themnourishment mental nourishment
psychological nourishment it is such apowerful book for leaders but also for.
(51:11):
Any individual to also diary to diary onprogress, because it's very, very useful.
And you do include that atthe end of the book as well.
Teresa, I'm aware that you're under timepressure and I could talk to you all day.
As I said, I think I got about 7 percentthrough my notes here, but for people who
want to find out more about your work,your research, and indeed your forthcoming
(51:33):
book, where's the best place to find you?
Teresa Amabile (51:35):
You can look at my faculty page on HBS.
.EDU The Harvard Business School website,, there's a faculty page on me and it
talks about my work that I'm doing.
It, , , has a link to theprogress principle book there.
And, , I don't yet have my new book upthere because we're still working on
(51:57):
the cover, but it will be there soon.
And the, , book that you've been talkingabout with me here is called the "Progress
Principle colon using small wins to ignitejoy, engagement and creativity at work".
And my new book is called "Retiring colonCreating a Life That Works for You".
(52:21):
And it will be coming out in fall 2024.
Aidan McCullen (52:25):
Absolutely gold author of the progress principle Teresa
Amabile, thank you for joining us
Teresa Amabile (52:32):
Thank you so much, Aidan.
It was my pleasure.
A close analysis of nearly twelve thousand diary entries
(00:03):
together with the writers daily ratingsof their motivations and emotions
shows that making progress in one'swork even incremental progress,
is more frequently associated withpositive emotions and high motivation.
Then any other workday event thekey to motivation doesn't depend
on elaborate incentive systems infact the people in this study rarely
(00:26):
mentioned incentives in their diaries.
On days when workers have the sensethey're making headway in their jobs
or when they receive support thathelps them overcome obstacles their
emotions are more positive and theirdrive to succeed is at its peak.
Drawing on over thirty years of researchtoday's book focuses on a study that
(00:49):
looked deeply inside seven companiestracking day to day events that move
the inner work lives of their people.
In addition to revealing how much intheir work life matters to employees and
thus to companies our guests researchturned up another deeper layer of meaning
concerning events that are part of everyworkers day three types of events in
(01:12):
particular what she calls the key threestand out as particularly potent forces
supporting inner work life in this orderprogress in meaningful work, catalysts
events that directly help project work,and nourishers interpersonal events
that uplift the people doing that work,.
(01:34):
It is a huge pleasure to welcomethe author of that book and that
research the author of the progressprinciple using simple wins to ignite
joy engagement and creativity at workteresa amabile welcome to the show,
Teresa Amabile (01:49):
Thank you so much.
Aiden.
I'm delighted to be herewith you and your audience
Aidan McCullen (01:53):
it's so great to have you been dying to cover this book for
such a long time and the good news foraudience i have a copy of this book up
for grabs for those people are signedup to our sub stack but firstly, teresa
i want to come to you and say thankyou for covering this book because I
know that your work has moved on andyou have made progress in your own
(02:14):
research and moved on to something else.
I thought we'd share that up front startof today's show because it's something
that I'd love to cover in the future.
Teresa Amabile (02:22):
Aidan.
I appreciate that.
I smile when I realize that youand I pronounce the main word
in my title differently, andthat's absolutely fine with me.
As you just , so concisely put it, thework That led to the book, The Progress
Principle, showed that of all theevents that happen at work that can
(02:43):
make for a truly wonderful workday,the single most important is simply
making progress in meaningful work.
After I finished that research, wrotethe book, gave many, many talks about the
book, I started wondering, What happenswhen people have meaningful work, and
(03:08):
then they need to leave that work behind?
What happens when people who havebeen really engaged in something
they're doing, have been doing acareer, a job, maybe for decades?
What happens?
What is that experience like as they'releaving it behind for retirement?
(03:29):
So that was what sparked my interest instudying retirement, which I've been doing
for the past decade now, with four amazingcolleagues here in the Boston area.
And we are right now finishing upthe book, reporting on that research.
The book is called, "Retiring,Creating a Life that Works for You."
(03:53):
So I am going to be hoping that I cancome on your show in the future and
talk about that research, that work, andwe do have some findings on creativity
and progress in that book as well.
It was coming out of 215 interviewswith 120 people over many years.
(04:15):
Some of whom we followed throughtheir retirement transition.
So I hope to be able to share thatwith your audience in the future
Aidan McCullen (04:22):
We would absolutely welcome that and maybe you'll give
us a few insights into that becauseI often think about this and I've
seen it with people when they retire.
If they're too interwoven their identityis too interwoven with their career they
really struggle with work life afterwork and they go back to the office
(04:43):
they think maybe they might fulfill lifewith golf or whatever they have decided
but soon enough that drives up and.
It makes total sense thatit's because probably they're
no longer making progress.
Teresa Amabile (04:56):
I think that's a big part of it.
In fact, that is one of themain findings of our research.
That is that identity issues can loomlarge as a person retires, especially for
those who closely identified with eitherthe work itself or their organization,
maybe their team, their profession.
(05:20):
If they felt that they were theirwork, , they didn't have much of
an identity outside of that work.
I am a lawyer.
I am a surgeon.
I'm an engineer.
I am a marketing specialist.
That transition can feel like.
(05:40):
losing yourself.
But we found also that for some people,the identity issues are not that strong.
They're not that extreme.
And yet the retirement transitioncan present difficulties
because of relationship issues.
(06:02):
Some people, of course, have identityissues and relationship issues, but
one of the most surprising findingswas how many couples happily together
for many years find that they, theyreally have to adjust to each other
(06:23):
after one or both of them retires.
They have to come upwith new relationships.
routines and rhythms for their life, theyneed to rediscover each other sometimes.
Because it's often the case thatthey have never had this much time
together, since they were first datingperhaps, they were first married.
(06:46):
Or maybe not ever, because when they firstgot together, they may well have already
been deeply engaged in work or study.
Something that occupied many, many hoursof their, their waking lives every week.
And now they're sitting there looking ateach other across the breakfast table and
(07:10):
sometimes wondering, who are you really?
What do we have to talk about?
What is it we'd like to do with ourday, our week, the rest of our lives?
So that, that's an interestingchallenge and , we've seen some
fascinating differences in the waysthat people approach that challenge.
(07:34):
And the third challenge, this maybe the biggest one, and it faces
everyone, is how to restructureyour life after you've retired.
And of course that has to do with theclose relationships you have and the, and
the more casual relationships you have,but it also has to do with the question of
(07:55):
what are you going to do with your time?
With the 35 or 40, sometimes 60 hours aweek that you've been spending engaged
in your work, whether you loved it oryou didn't love it at all, your work
structured your life for many, many years.
(08:15):
And now it's up to you tostructure your life to decide
how you want to spend your time.
Do you want to be really activeright from the beginning?
Do you want to be, on the go, go,go, travel, or volunteer work, or
perhaps finding a part time job?
Do you want to get very engaged in takingcare of your grandchildren, perhaps?
(08:41):
Or would you prefer a more relaxedpace and just seeing what emerges?
In your life, maybe, spending moretime reading the books that you've
been stacking up and waiting toget to gardening enjoying walks,
becoming more physically fit.
(09:01):
There are great variations in whatpeople end up finding for themselves
and building this new life and how longit takes them to find a life structure
that really feels satisfying for them.
Aidan McCullen (09:17):
You've whet our appetite for this show as well because preparing
for that obviously has to happen beforethe event itself so you have to do the
work before you discover just like aninnovation you do the work before the
crisis so the crisis isn't so bad whichis a beautiful way for the progress
principle the progress principle i shouldsay i keep interchanging it so i've been
(09:41):
trying to pronounce it the way you do,
there's a lot of things we aresure what my irish accent would say
differently including Amabile whichi had to practice before we came on
to the show live, so let's get intothe progress principle because i have
to say it made me think about so manythings reading this book and if you're
(10:02):
a manager or ceo or your lead peoplein anyway or even just leading yourself
understanding this principle is so
valuable for your progress of work butalso for your mental health i felt that
big time and also in the fact that wheni think about the times i was frustrated
in my working life, it's because i was nolonger making any progress i was maybe in
(10:29):
when i was a professional athlete injuredor not getting selected in the team.
Or in the real world when i was workingin organizations many times working
in innovation somebody like a cfokilling the progress killing the idea.
Absolutely had a dramatic effect onyour mental health as an innovator
(10:50):
or change maker so maybe we'll openwith that because that would make
it hyper relevant to our audience
Teresa Amabile (10:56):
You noted that many managers don't give the
sufficient thought, and that wasone of the biggest surprises to us.
After we discovered the progressprinciple, and how, that is, how
important it is for people to beable to make at least some progress
(11:19):
in their work on a regular basis.
We told , some groups ofexecutives about this finding.
And we often got a kind of puzzledlook from them, or maybe a shrug.
Well, sure.
Yeah, people feel goodwhen they Make progress.
(11:42):
Sure.
Yeah, everybody knows that.
But you know what?
We didn't think so.
Because the managers in the companieswhere we did this diary study, many of
the managers seemed oblivious of theimportance of progress, because they
did virtually nothing to pay attentionto whether their people, their teams,
(12:08):
were able to make regular progress.
In their work, so we did a little surveyof nearly 700 managers and executives
from companies around the world.
We asked them a simple question.
We're going to list 5 motivators.
(12:29):
We're going to ask you of thesemotivators rank order them in terms
of how important you think they are.
For people in their work.
We had the usual suspects.
We had tangible reward for the work,pay, promotion, that sort of thing.
(12:50):
Recognition for the work.
We had clear goals in thework, interpersonal support,
and of course we had progress.
Now, we know from our research thatprogress was number 1 by far in terms
of being able to motivate peopleday to day to really get into their
(13:15):
work, engage in it, innovatively,creatively, productively these.
669 managers.
did not rank Progress asthe number one motivator.
In fact, they didn't rank it as thenumber two motivator, or the number
three, or the number four motivator.
(13:38):
They ranked it, on average, over allthese people, it was ranked dead last.
In fact, only 5 percent of thesemanagers ranked Progress number one.
If they had been making theirchoices randomly, 20 percent of
them would have selected progress.
(13:58):
Number 1, it's as if they were saying,we don't think this is that important.
And it's more importantthan anything else.
So that.
To me is the most shocking finding ofthis and why I felt so driven to write
(14:19):
this book and to get the word out.
And I've written a number ofarticles with this message.
I've tried to speak withas many groups as I can.
And I'm so delighted that you'rebringing this message to your audience.
Because it's not top of mindand I can understand that.
Managers have a lot tothink about in their work.
(14:41):
It's not easy.
They have to think about their strategy.
They have to think about what aretheir customers doing, what are
their customers wanting and needing.
They have to thinkabout their competitors.
They have to think about what'sgoing on in the in the local
environment, the local economy.
They have to think about what'sgoing on in the global economy.
(15:04):
What are the social and demographictrends that might be affecting our
business now and in the future?
There's a lot, and it makes it so easyto stop thinking about what's going
on internally with the people whoare actually executing your strategy.
(15:26):
They need the catalyst that you mentioned.
They need the nourishers youmentioned on a regular basis.
They need at least a bit of attentionevery day, every week, so that they can
simply be enabled to do their best work.
That is to make progress in their work.
Aidan McCullen (15:47):
i thought about this teresa as a parent , i
remember my younger guy.
Never played soccer before and he's crazyabout soccer now but his friends were
ahead of him a few years and knowing how,you can actually create positive habits
i brought him out regularly and yourbook helped me even think back over that
(16:10):
and i thought about why he has done sowell was because each day we practiced.
I considered that i was setting thebar low enough that he would succeed so
it was slightly difficult but it wouldbe slightly more difficult but not too
difficult and i think it's that sweetspot that to your point he's making
progress but then i also understoodthe neuroscience of that that there's a
(16:34):
dopamine hit behind this every time whenyou achieve it's almost like having your
to do list everyday and as you take thingsoff being you get it open me in here and
then at the end of the book you talk aboutthe checklist and the importance of this
daily checklist and i'm jumping to therebecause i know, many of our listeners are
extremely busy and may not get throughthe entire show so i thought this was so
(16:59):
so important that i bring it right fromthe back of the book right to the front.
And share this with our audienceparticularly if you're a manager.
, Teresa Amabile (17:05):
you want to use a checklist, like this, to help
yourself think about what yourpeople need to make progress.
Now, that means you need to be inclose enough touch with them either
observing them frequently, ideallycommunicating with them about how
the work is going, what they need,what might be getting in the way.
(17:27):
So I'm going to go through thecatalysts, which are on the checklist.
I'm going to go throughthe nourishers as well.
But let me first of all say, Initially,you want to just ask people, find out if
they feel they're making progress on themost important work that they need to do.
(17:48):
And if not, why not?
If so, what's helping to catalyze theirprogress so that you can make sure that
those supports stay in place for them.
The opposite of progress,of course, is setbacks.
So you do want to have progress andsetbacks right at the top of your
checklist this note are people Makingprogress in their most important work
(18:16):
and you want to look specificallyat the catalysts for progress Are
these things that you're doing?
Are these things that your people have.
The opposite of thecatalyst are the obstacles.
So as I go through the catalyst, you caneasily imagine what the opposites are.
And those are things that you want totry to scrub from your work environment
(18:37):
as much as possible , and dampen themdown as much as you can as a manager.
The first catalyst is simplyclear goals and meaningful work.
Make sure that people understand how whatthey do every day connects to something
(18:57):
that matters, whether it's setting upthe laboratory for the scientists, so that
everything they need the next morning.
is in place, they can do theirwork in trying to discover new
drugs to treat serious diseases.
I actually spoke with a janitor, thehead of maintenance services at a
(19:23):
pharmaceutical, a biopharma companyseveral years ago, and he talked about
how meaningful he felt his work was.
Because he and his team were enablingthe scientists to get in there and do
the work of helping to cure diseases.
He was able to connect what hewas doing to that meaningful goal.
(19:43):
And I think it's because that companydid a great job of occasionally
bringing in patients who hadbeen helped by their medicines.
And inviting everyone in thecompany to come to these sessions.
Or to watch the video of, the patienttalking about how their lives had
been transformed and the goals haveto be clear, not just meaningful,
(20:05):
but clear people need to know whatthey're doing and why it matters.
The next is autonomy.
So, even as people arehaving those clear goals.
They need to feel that they have autonomy.
They have some freedom in decidinghow to meet those goals, that
they can use their own ideas.
They can use their owncreativity to get there.
(20:27):
Next is sufficient resources.
You can't do the work if you don't havethe necessary resources, and I'm not
talking about lavish resources, whichcan actually kind of smother a project.
I'm talking about the resources thatpeople really need to get their work
done, so that they're not spendingall of their time trying to find those
(20:52):
resources rather than doing the work.
The next is simply help with the work.
When things are really difficult,getting people the expertise that they
need, the information that they need,or perhaps sitting down and helping
yourself in any way that you can.
The next catalyst is in some ways,the most difficult for managers to do.
(21:17):
And that is having an atmosphere whereeveryone views problems and mistakes
as learning opportunities, ratherthan opportunities to bury it, pretend
it didn't happen, or opportunitiesto castigate people and blame.
No, let's look at what happened.
(21:39):
Let's see what we can learnfrom it and move on from there.
The next catalyst is open idea flow.
And that is within the group,ideally within the department and
within the whole organization, asense that new ideas are welcome.
And I'm sure you've seen thisin your innovation research
(22:00):
yourself, your innovation practice.
Ideas are welcome.
Not that every idea will be accepted.
Of course not.
But every idea will be respected enoughto get a fair hearing and finally
sufficient time, but not too much.
We found that people do their optimalwork and make the best progress.
(22:24):
when they understand that there is anurgent need for what they're doing,
that adds to the meaningfulness of it.
But when they have enough time to think,when they have enough time to explore for
that creative solution, that's going toreally serve better the purpose that they
have for , that clear and meaningful goal.
(22:44):
So those are the seven catalysts.
I'll go through them quickly again, cleargoals and meaningful work, Autonomy.
sufficient resources, help withthe work, learning from problems
and successes, open idea flow, andsufficient time, but not too much.
(23:06):
So those are the factorsthat catalyze progress.
And you can imagine theopposite of each of those.
Try not to do those things.
Aidan McCullen (23:17):
Well, the catalysts, I mean, they seem so simple and they
seem so straightforward, but as youshow in your research, and I want to
share the depth of the research here,I mentioned the 12, 000 and the seven
companies, these were real companies.
I want to share that with ouraudience, real companies anonymized.
The people were anonymized andthese people talk at time every
(23:40):
day to daily diary, what wasgoing on in their inner work life.
And I want to share whatthat term means as well.
But before we do share that research, I'dlove you to do share, share the opposite,
just for anybody who's unaware of that,because there was stuff like autonomy,
but there's a sweet spot with all thesethings that , autonomy is great, but
(24:01):
sometimes people feel somebody who'sgiving them autonomy with no direction
means that they don't care or they'rescattered, et cetera, or the opposite.
In times of crisis, amanager might think they're.
Giving guidance, but they're micromanagingand there's a, there's a lot in there.
So it's probably veryuseful to show the opposite.
I'd love if you would.
Teresa Amabile (24:22):
Of course.
Yes.
And you actually use the phrase.
That's the key here with autonomy.
You want direction.
People can get, if they have toomuch autonomy, there's no direction.
You need to combine the cleargoals with the autonomy, right?
So people should know whichmountain we're going to climb.
(24:45):
That's the clear goals, but theyshould have autonomy as much as
possible in deciding how to climbit as long as they're getting there.
As long as they are making progresstoward that goal, allow them
as much autonomy as possible.
Micromanaging is definitelythe opposite of autonomy.
That's almost never the way to go.
(25:06):
There does need to be a balanceof the clarity of goals.
But the autonomy in achieving the goals.
Efficient resources, you know, I've seena number of cases where people were so
starved of resources, resources thatI knew existed in the organization,
(25:27):
because I had a bigger picture ofwhat was going on in the organization,
but they didn't have access to thoseresources because they didn't have a
manager who was advocating for them.
They couldn't get access, forexample, to the equipment they needed.
To do that next experiment .To test thisnew product, or to test this manufacturing
(25:49):
process that they were developing . All itwould take was a little bit of attention
on the part of the manager to say, oh,well, we, you know, we can work out
the schedule so that the departmentscan seamlessly share this equipment.
Rather than the department thathappens to have the biggest bully
for their manager, getting theaccess to the equipment all the time.
(26:11):
Right?
So there are a lot of politicalissues in organizations.
That managers can cut through,but the people doing the work
cannot cut through those.
The opposite of that is simply ignoringthe fact that people are struggling.
And not realizing that sometimes simpleaccess to an expert who exists in the
organization , could get them overthe hump , of a complex project where
(26:37):
they're suffering setback after setback,learning from problems and successes.
there are 2 forms of opposites there.
1 is pretending that it didn'thappen and never talking about it.
Which just leads to feelingsof shame and embarrassment.
Or calling people out, calling individualsout for having made a mistake or for
(27:03):
having tried something that failed.
Which also leads to shame, andpulling back, , and risk aversion.
So the ideal is to say, yeah, this didn'twork right, or yes, this was a mistake.
But what can we learn from it?
Let's try to extractsome failure value here.
(27:25):
Because almost always it is possible,at least to extract a lesson of
how not to do things in the future.
But sometimes there's a real gem oflearning within a mistake or a setback
and the projects that we studied, theproject teams that we studied, were all
(27:45):
working on complex problems that requiredcreative solutions and you can't work
on a creative problem without makingsome mistakes without having some dead
ends that you follow, you have to havean atmosphere of psychological safety.
That's a term that , my colleague, AmyEdmondson at Harvard Business School
(28:07):
has written about so eloquently anddone so much important research on.
If you can establish that psychologicalsafety in the organization, where you
yourself, the manager , will, Admitwhen you've made a mistake, when
you've tried something that, okay,folks, we tried this new approach.
It's not working.
Let's regroup.
Let's do something else thatfrees everyone up to feel that
(28:31):
they can take reasonable risks.
They can be creative and it's not goingto be the end of the world if it doesn't
work out and finally sufficient time Isaw so many cases of what we call being
on a treadmill Where people feel thatthey're just running constantly from one
thing to the next with no time to thinkthat's Never optimal for creativity.
(28:58):
Yeah.
Sometimes creative work has to bedone under the gun when there's a
truly urgent need for a solution.
If that's the case, it's importantto clear the decks and, allow people
to simply focus on that problemand not be distracted by meetings
(29:19):
and administrative paperwork.
And that sort of thing,but to really focus.
Can I tell a little storyhere from, from our diaries?
Aidan McCullen (29:28):
Please do.
Teresa Amabile (29:31):
So this was a fascinating story of an information management
team that was about, , six peopleworking on an incredibly important
project for the company with 145million at stake for the company.
(29:52):
And they had only 8 daysto solve this problem.
It was a problem having to do withtheir most important customer.
This information management team.
Was 1, where we saw more catalysts andnourishers during those 8 days than we saw
(30:12):
in some other teams, the entire period ofmonths that we followed them for 1 thing.
Top management made very clearhow important this project was.
So everyone knew that it really mattered.
It was a meaningful goal.
The top management also clearedthe decks for that team, told them,
(30:36):
don't worry about anything elsethat's been on your plate right now.
You can set aside all the other projectsand simply focus on this problem.
Everyone on the team pulled together.
In fact, one person postponed hervacation week, so she could come
in and work with her teammates onthis, intensely important project.
(31:00):
Certain groups in the organization helpedout, helping to do analyses or bringing
in information that might be useful.
No one showed more catalysts andnourishers, though, than that team leader.
She Got in there rolled up her sleevesand worked right alongside everyone else
solving 1 technical problem after anotherand she kept everyone's spirits up by
(31:26):
doing things like singing a silly songas midnight approached on the 7th night.
Well, the outcome was a success.
A true example of creativeproductivity, they did it.
And their feelings duringthat time you might think were
(31:47):
terrible, but they were not.
It was just the opposite.
They were energized by this.
They felt an incrediblesense of camaraderie.
In fact, 1 guy on this team said inhis diary, things have been crazy.
We've been working around the clock,but everyone has been staying on
(32:09):
the cheery side of the street.
God help me.
I do love them so, so, I mean, it wasjust a marvelous, marvelous story.
Aidan McCullen (32:20):
You beat me to it and i absolutely love that story it
was one i definitely wanted to shareif you don't mind i'll just quote
a little piece from here because.
This can show how simple a smallgesture can be so this lady who
had she had a family by the way soshe came back from holidays having
a family left the family etc.
(32:41):
And you expected to seeher diary entry being.
Extremely negative like we allwould but you were surprised by the
opposite but it was because of thisgoldilocks effect of several different
catalysts one of them was so simplea senior manager drop by with some
she called it fancy mineral water.
(33:01):
And in the book you write perhaps for thefirst time in a long while the top manager
was humanized he had done something ininverted commas nice, he had shown that
he noticed her work and he cared but themanagers gesture, Altered perceptions
of the work itself, which are even morecentral to the way that progress operates
(33:22):
on the inner work life, because highlevel managers almost never stopped by
to encourage the team in any way and hisaction signified to the team how important
this project was to the organization that.
Seemingly simple gesture that seeminglymeaningless gesture had such a dramatic
effect on inner work life of people andi'm using that as a segue to share that
(33:47):
before we then share the research andthe depth of research that you did here.
Teresa Amabile (33:52):
Yes, thank you , for quoting that.
Because I'd forgotten that little bitabout stopping by with mineral water.
And I think the next nighthe stopped by with pizza.
They were working late and he camewith some boxes of pizza, right?
Yeah, I see you nodding.
Yes.
And the other thing I wanted to mentionwas there were nourishers there, right?
(34:12):
The four nourishers are, firstof all, respect and recognition.
He was showing That herespected their work.
He understood what experts they werein this particular problem solving
realm, and he recognized them.
He recognized them as individuals andas a team for what they were doing.
(34:33):
The second nourisher is encouragement.
Of course, he was encouragingthem and what they were doing.
The third nourisher is emotional support.
I don't think he specifically showedemotional support, but that team leader
absolutely showed emotional support.
(34:55):
She was there for her people.
If they were struggling withsomething professionally or
personally, they could talk to her.
And the fourth one,affiliation and camaraderie.
Well, you saw it allover that story, right?
Someone giving up her vacation week.
someone else saying we're all workingaround the clock doing just crazy
(35:17):
hard things, but we love each other.
We're in this together.
It was really an almost perfectexample of the seven catalysts
and the four nourishers.
Aidan McCullen (35:30):
It's a great story and let's mention that before i keep
bringing you off track by the wayi've only got like five percent of
my notes and again i have a copyof the book up for grabs i highly
highly recommend the book it can be.
Somewhat hurtful reading in times i wassad reading the diary entries of many
many of the people because i empathizedas well because i've been there.
(35:54):
And i'll just quote a little piecehere because this will actually be
a nice way to introduce the companiesand the research that you did.
This company you anonymized as carpenterthe book opens with this company selling
off whatever assets is left of thecompany auctions of the furniture and
some of the key workers, standing therein the auction lot looking on distraught.
(36:18):
And four years previously.
Carpenter had brought in a new topexecutive team which reorganized all
the divisions into cross functionalbusiness teams with each team managing
a set of related product lines, thiscompany at the time was top of the
game recognized as being innovative.
When interviewers asked for thecompany's success formula, these
executives told a compelling story aboutthe new model they were bringing in.
(36:42):
Each team was to function as anentrepreneurial group, autonomously
responsible for everything frominventing new products to managing
inventory and profitability.
Best of all they would have the resourcesof a substantial corporation to back
them up with minimal interference.
Fast forward then to another excerpti took this was a fateful product
(37:03):
meeting that took place and thiswas from a diary entry by one of the
people in that this product reviewmeeting proved to be a major event
for the people of the domain team.
This will make so much senseto so many of our audiences.
Teresa, |" Like the slash of asword, it cut down months of the
(37:23):
team's product development work.
Not only did it provoke unhappinessand frustration, it soured
people's views of management anddrained motivation of the work.
Well- meaning as we know theywere carpenters managers did not
understand the power of what you callinner work life, the perceptions,
emotions and motivations that peopleexperience as they react to and make
(37:48):
sense of the events in the workday."
That is such a crucial part of thebook and one that our audience which
are many change makers many peopleworking in longer term projects
even in transformation that.
They can be Working on something and thenall of a sudden new management come in
(38:10):
change direction and all the work alltheir progress is just gone overnight
Teresa Amabile (38:15):
Absolutely.
And think about, you correctly notedthat inner work life is the perceptions,
emotions, and motivations that peoplehave as they react to and try to make
sense of the events going on around them.
What sense did they make of this?
The sense they made ofit was, we don't matter.
(38:38):
Our ideas don't matter.
Our efforts are fruitless.
What does that do to perceptions ofthe organization and self perceptions?
What does that do to emotions?
You can hear it in, in,in that description.
And, and what does it do to motivation?
(39:00):
Kills it.
It kills it.
So, yes, of course, sometimesmanagers do need to change direction.
They need to change strategybecause external conditions
have changed dramatically.
But they can do it in a way thatdoesn't kill inner work life.
They can do it in a way that says,Oof, this is a body blow to us.
(39:25):
And we know it's going tofeel even worse to you.
We respect what you've done.
You have done great work.
And maybe someday we can returnto developing this product
line, to developing thesegreat ideas that you have.
What you have done will not be lost.
But please work with us.
(39:46):
To go in this new direction
That is not at all what this companydid this company that we call carpenter.
They just came in by Fiat.
Okay, what you've done,it's all off the table.
This is what you're going to be doing now.
(40:06):
And that company became a drain.
It became a drain where the very bestpeople were just leaving in droves and
they couldn't, stop that brain drain.
And within just, I think it was threeyears after that incident that you
(40:27):
described there, the company wasdoing very poorly, , innovation had
dried up to a trickle, profitabilityhad tanked, and the company was
acquired by a smaller rival.
And then it was being completely sold off.
And that's the auction that you described.
(40:47):
And some people, , this was acompany town, pretty much people
from the community, many of them,former workers here, we're standing
around watching this auction andseeing , , their desks and their
chairs and their, workstations being,auctioned off, just standing there,
some of them with tears in their eyes.
Aidan McCullen (41:07):
Very sad very sad and that's what i mean
the empathy you have with thatbecause these are real companies.
Let's share how you did this how you didthis research because the appendix in
the book is huge because of the amount ofresearch that you and your colleagues did.
Teresa Amabile (41:21):
Yes.
Listeners, you don't have toread the research appendix.
I will give you the, I will give youa very high level version right now.
, we decided that the best way to understandwhat really happens at work inside
people's hearts and minds was to ask themto fill out a very short, Confidential
electronic diary for us every day duringthe entire course of a project because
(41:47):
of my fascination with creativity andinnovation and how important that is
for for the success of any business.
And any social initiative, bythe way, any nonprofit as well,
I wanted to study people workingon complex, creative projects.
So we, we sought teams of peoplewho are doing such projects
(42:10):
because work like that does notget done by individuals any longer.
We're in a world whereteams do this sort of work.
So we went to a number of companies.
asking if we might, they mightallow us to recruit their teams
doing complex creative projects.
This was mostly product development.
(42:30):
Sometimes it was process development.
Sometimes it was solvingcomplex client problems.
About half the companies we approachedsaid, yes, and we ended up with
7 companies participating in thisresearch, a total of 26 project
teams within those 7 companies and239 individuals in those teams.
(42:54):
And a team would sign up , if reallyjust about everyone on the team , was
willing to participate in the teamsvaried in size from 3 people to 9 people.
And that's fairlytypical in organizations.
for your questions.
The projects people wereworking on varied in length.
The shortest was 3 monthsand the longest was 9 months.
(43:16):
We use a number of techniques to keeppeople motivated to fill out these
electronic diaries for us at the endof each workday, Monday through Friday.
We just sent it in the email.
It was a very short survey withsome numerical questions on it about
their emotions, perceptions andmotivations that day, specifically.
(43:38):
And the most important question at theend of the diary, the daily diary was.
Of all the events that happened today,think of one that stands out in your mind.
It can be any event at all, as longas it's relevant to your work or
this project that you're working on.
And we tell them it could even besomething from their personal life, as
(44:00):
long as it was relevant to their work.
And we asked them to describethe event very concretely, what
happened, and who was involved.
That was how , we were able to study.
The impact of these day by dayevents inside organizations on
people's inner work life, and wewere able to study the impact of
(44:23):
inner work life on people's work.
Not only did we have these diaries,but we also got assessments.
Of each individual's creativityand productivity and Colleagueship
and commitment to the workevery month from their closest
(44:44):
colleagues and their supervisors.
So we had these, these externalmeasures of people's performance.
And we made our 1st discovery, puttingthat performance data together with
the inner work life data, whichwe had from every daily diary.
We knew about emotions, perceptions, andmotivations from those daily diaries.
(45:06):
And the first discovery we callthe inner work life effect.
And that is on those days, and thoseweeks, and those months when people are
having their most positive emotions,, their most positive perceptions of
the organization, their team, Eventhemselves, and when they have the
strongest intrinsic motivation, thatis being really jazzed about the
(45:31):
work, really excited about the work.
And those days and weeks and months,that's precisely when people are most
likely to be creative in their work,productive, show the highest level
of commitment to their work, andbe better colleagues to each other,
which of course raises the level ofeveryone else's performance around them.
(45:53):
So that's the inner work life effect.
And then we thought, okay, if inner worklife is so important to performance, what
makes a difference for inner work life?
And that's when we discoveredthe progress principle.
We went in and looked at people'svery best inner work life days, you
(46:15):
know, the best emotions, motivationsand perceptions and the very worst.
And we looked at whether therewere differences in the kinds of
events occurring on those days.
And, oh boy, did we find huge differences.
The single biggest differentiator.
(46:37):
was whether people were makingprogress in their work or
having setbacks in their work.
The best inner work life days, 76percent of those best inner work
life days had a progress event.
67 percent of the worst innerwork life days had a setback,
(46:57):
which is the opposite of progress.
It's feeling like you're being stalledin your work, you can't move forward,
or maybe you're, even going backwards.
It's
We did find other positive events,of course, and other negative events,
but none of them even came closeto being as important , as progress
(47:19):
or in its negative form setbacks.
We even found what we callthe power of small wins.
And that is the progress principleeven operates with really small step
forward, steps forward, things thatto us as observers looked almost
trivial, but they could be so meaningfuland so energizing and motivating to
(47:44):
people on the day that they happen.
An example is again from thatinformation management team.
I was talking about beforewe had an engineer who was
working at a very complex.
Computer program for an important clientand there was a bug in the program that
he wasn't able to identify for a few daysand we saw him in his diary every day
(48:09):
say, ah, this bug is driving me crazy.
I can't figure it out.
And then later in the week,he said, I smashed that bug.
That's been frustrating mefor almost a calendar week.
That may not be an event to you, but Ilive a very drab life, so I'm all hyped.
(48:30):
Most of my team members who wouldknow about this are out today.
So I have to sit here rejoicingin my solitary smugness.
That is one of my very favorite diaryentries, which is why I've memorized it.
His joy was palpable and in the ratingshe gave for his emotions, perceptions,
(48:51):
motivation that day, as you might imagine,we're all at the top of the scale.
That's a really small thing, right?
In the, in the grand scheme of thatguy's Career, even in the grand scheme
of that project, it was no big thing.
It was just a bug.
But the thing is, it was a big thing tohim on the day that it happened, , and
(49:13):
he was happy for days after that.
And we know from our research , , inthis research program, that being happy,
you're more likely to be creative andproductive and more committed to the work
that you're doing and a better colleague.
To other people.
And interestingly, we found that28 percent of small events had a
(49:38):
really big impact on inner worklife the day that they happened.
Unfortunately, negative events havea stronger impact in the negative
direction than positive eventshave in the positive direction 3
to 4 times as strong an impact.
So that means ideally for every.
(49:59):
Step backward and there arealways going to be steps backward.
You need to help people have a coupleof steps forward if you're going to
truly promote positive inner work life.
If you can do that with, the concreteobvious management 101 things you do,
those catalysts and those nourishers.
(50:21):
You are likely to set some positivespirals in motion where people are
having good inner work life becauseof the nourishers you're giving them.
They're therefore more likelyto make progress, especially
if you have catalysts in place.
And that in turn, that progress isgoing to lead to better inner work
(50:43):
life, which will in turn lead to morecreative and productive progress.
Aidan McCullen (50:50):
Beautiful absolutely beautiful i had a quote that was a
call to action for leaders but youabsolutely nailed it there is exactly
the right concept of helping peoplemake progress clear the obstacles
give them encouragement give themnourishment mental nourishment
psychological nourishment it is such apowerful book for leaders but also for.
(51:11):
Any individual to also diary to diary onprogress, because it's very, very useful.
And you do include that atthe end of the book as well.
Teresa, I'm aware that you're under timepressure and I could talk to you all day.
As I said, I think I got about 7 percentthrough my notes here, but for people who
want to find out more about your work,your research, and indeed your forthcoming
(51:33):
book, where's the best place to find you?
Teresa Amabile (51:35):
You can look at my faculty page on HBS.
.EDU The Harvard Business School website,, there's a faculty page on me and it
talks about my work that I'm doing.
It, , , has a link to theprogress principle book there.
And, , I don't yet have my new book upthere because we're still working on
(51:57):
the cover, but it will be there soon.
And the, , book that you've been talkingabout with me here is called the "Progress
Principle colon using small wins to ignitejoy, engagement and creativity at work".
And my new book is called "Retiring colonCreating a Life That Works for You".
(52:21):
And it will be coming out in fall 2024.
Aidan McCullen (52:25):
Absolutely gold author of the progress principle Teresa
Amabile, thank you for joining us
Teresa Amabile (52:32):
Thank you so much, Aidan.
It was my pleasure.
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